Winter 2020

I hope you and your families are safe during this terrible unprecedented time. There are a few silver linings ( as long as we observe the requested social distancing). It can be a time to catch up on jobs previously neglected about the home and we can still do lots online. For instance if you are living in an apartment without a garden now might be a great time to plant up indoor gardens, especially herbs. There is a free download facility just today made available from audible. It’s stories.audible.com. Do take a look. I feel fortunate in that I always write at home and even whilst traveling I always bring research and relevant work with me.

Panjim, Goa               Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, Interior.

 

The Ayurveda Resort

Relaxing in an Ayurveda Resort , Goa.

 

I shall never tire of Mumbai. This was a precious time.

Travel which I enjoy now seems a distant luxury. I cannot complain. I do feel privileged. We spent much of January in India where we visited Mumbai and Goa. We spent a week at an Ayurveda Resort in Goa which was relaxing. We ate vegetarian food which was absolutely delicious and we felt very healthy. I love the bustle of Mumbai.  We even were able to go to a play in a Cultural Centre, The Mirror Crack’ed, an Agatha Christie story relocated in Goa during the nineteen seventies.

We really enjoyed that play and last we’ll see for some time.

We were fortunate to visit Kyiv in February before COVID 19 took over our lives here in England. We watched it unfold in Italy whilst there and my heart goes out to the people of Spain and Italy. This visit was wonderful and will be the last for some time as the world closes borders.

I love visiting galleries in Kyiv

 

Inside St Volodymyr’s Cathedral , Kyiv.

Older people gather to exercise in the Park. This was only three weeks ago!

Winter in Kyiv 2020

Now I am trying not to listen to too much news. I am a hermit holed up in Oxfordshire immersed in writing. My new novel The Silken Rose will be published at last on 2nd April – at last so please buy it, a great price on amazon. The Woman in the Shadows has been re released by Headline as Mistress Cromwell. Time to read this if you would like to know about Thomas Cromwell’s career and marriage before his wife died of another sort of pandemic much feared by Londoners known as The Sweat.

The Silken Rose has a new look. Publication 2nd April.

 

Other writing news-I am totally now immersed in writing a non fiction on Tudor Sex and Sexuality for Pen & Sword. It’s fun to research and write. I shall also be writing a biography of Princess Gytha, The Last Anglo-Saxon Princess from The Betrothed Sister for Pen & Sword. All the visits to Kyiv will have paid off and I very much look forward to writing it. The Betrothed Sister was meticulously researched and that novel is available from amazon should you be interested.

The manuscript of The Damask Rose is about to go into the editing stage with Headline. I am also beginning to write The Stone Rose for Headline about Isabella of France. I am busy.

Please do keep well. Keep reading and get fresh air but also observe directives about social distancing. If you go to my website home page www.carolcmcgrath.co.uk  you can subscribe to my newsletter. There will be an edition next week. There’s a link on a drop down there as well as a free short story about Thomas Cromwell called The Tudor Boy which opens a serial. I can send any episodes missed.

Keep well. Stay safe.

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